Toothbrush

Get a free Colgate toothbrush at Target. Sign up for mobile offers to get a coupon for $1 off a Colgate toothbrush, priced under a buck which will make it free. Just show your mobile device for scanning at the register. Click here to sign up online or text "THANKS" to 827438 on your smartphone. "Like" Doreen's Deals page on Facebook ; follow Doreen Christensen on Twitter@PrettyGoodIdeas and sign up for Deals text alerts

Get a free Colgate toothbrush at Target. Sign up for mobile offers to get a coupon for $1 off a Colgate toothbrush, priced under a buck which will make it free. Just show your mobile device for scanning at the register. Click here to sign up online or text "THANKS" to 827438 on your smartphone. "Like" Doreen's Deals page on Facebook ; follow Doreen Christensen on Twitter@PrettyGoodIdeas and sign up for Deals text alerts

Colgate is giving away free kids' character toothbrushes when they participate in the Healthy Habits for a Lifetime program. Colgate's program, a partnership with RIF (Reading Is Fundamental), aims to help parents and kids make washing hands, brushing teeth and reading part of their bedtime routine. Here's how it works: Sign up for the program, use an online log to help kids keep track of their progress of washing, brushing and reading and then Colgate will send along the free toothbrush to all kids in the household who participate.

Here's something hard to sink your teeth into: A black market for white teeth. Palm Beach County sheriff's deputies raided a pawnshop and arrested its manager, Igor Roytikh, 44, for allegedly selling stolen dental products, such as electric toothbrushes and whiting strips, from retailers and then selling them on the internet, reports The Palm Beach Post. Authorities went after this ring tooth and nail, also charging Lauren Ann Healy, 23, and Brian Hegmann, 26, both of Deerfield Beach, for supplying the shop with the stolen merchandise.

Here's something hard to sink your teeth into: A black market for white teeth. Palm Beach County sheriff's deputies raided a pawnshop and arrested its manager, Igor Roytikh, 44, for allegedly selling stolen dental products, such as electric toothbrushes and whiting strips, from retailers and then selling them on the internet, reports The Palm Beach Post. Authorities went after this ring tooth and nail, also charging Lauren Ann Healy, 23, and Brian Hegmann, 26, both of Deerfield Beach, for supplying the shop with the stolen merchandise.

MUNICH, West Germany -- A silver- and gold-plated toothbrush that belonged to French emperor Napoleon I will go on auction in October with a minimum asking price of $25,900, the auction house Hermann Historica said on Saturday. Historica officials said the toothbrush, which is also decorated with Napoleon`s coat of arms, came from the estate of a British officer who found it after the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. TEACHERS HOLD SUPERSTITIONS ARLINGTON, Texas -- A high percentage of high school biology teachers profess superstitious beliefs, and about one in four think some races of people are inherently more intelligent than others, according to a survey by the University of Texas, Arlington.

Massachusetts is the first state to add toothbrush time to the color-nap-snack-and-play routine of preschools, requiring that all children who eat a meal at day care, or attend for more than four hours, brush their teeth during class and be educated about oral health. The regulations, which went into effect last week, are being praised by some parents and caregivers while causing a tempest in a toothbrush for others, according to schools and chat rooms. "I don't want someone's hand in my child's mouth," said Sarah Brodsky, a teacher at First Path Day Care in Watertown and mother of 4-month-old Noah.

You`d never dream of brushing your teeth with water from the toilet bowl, would you? Yet, you may be doing precisely that, says Dr. Willard Charnetzky, an associate professor of biological sciences at Florida Atlantic University who is researching the subject. "Every time you flush the toilet an aerosol is produced," Charnetzky said. "It`s not very appealing to realize that some of that water ends up on the toothbrush. Everyone assumes their toothbrush is good for them." The microorganisms that may spread from toilet bowl to toothbrush include those that cause dysentery and diarrhea, he says.

Is it asking too much for your kids to quietly brush their tiny teeth so you won't have gigantic dental bills? Evidently, yes. The latest in "singing toothbrushes" is Tooth Tunes Junior by Hasbro. Sized for ages 3 to 6 and available at drugstores and discounters such as Wal-Mart and Target, the toothbrush plays a 1-minute tune so kids know how long to brush. (The American Dental Association recommends 2-minute brushings so, as kids get older, encourage them to work up to that.) Among the ditties are takeoffs of older songs: Waking Up is Hard To Do, based on Neil Sedaka's Breaking Up is Hard to Do. And If You're Happy and You Know It, Brush Your Teeth.

Colgate is giving away free kids' character toothbrushes when they participate in the Healthy Habits for a Lifetime program. Colgate's program, a partnership with RIF (Reading Is Fundamental), aims to help parents and kids make washing hands, brushing teeth and reading part of their bedtime routine. Here's how it works: Sign up for the program, use an online log to help kids keep track of their progress of washing, brushing and reading and then Colgate will send along the free toothbrush to all kids in the household who participate.

Massachusetts is the first state to add toothbrush time to the color-nap-snack-and-play routine of preschools, requiring that all children who eat a meal at day care, or attend for more than four hours, brush their teeth during class and be educated about oral health. The regulations, which went into effect last week, are being praised by some parents and caregivers while causing a tempest in a toothbrush for others, according to schools and chat rooms. "I don't want someone's hand in my child's mouth," said Sarah Brodsky, a teacher at First Path Day Care in Watertown and mother of 4-month-old Noah.

With the help of a gum-chomping machine and years of careful chemistry, University of Kentucky researchers have developed a chewing gum that can help replace toothpaste and a toothbrush -- thus improving the health of soldiers in the field, as well as children in poor countries. Seriously. Gum. In what is known around the UK College of Pharmacy by the ever-so-catchy title of "the military gum project," an antimicrobial, known as KSL, is infused in chewing gum. KSL is anti-adhesive and abrasive agent that disrupts and helps dissolve plaque.

So this is how it works? We must be at the airport 90 minutes early to pay for checked luggage, then we get searched by camera, blower, hands, maybe even taken to a small room and interrogated, while our carry-on luggage is searched for the wrong size, the wrong knife, the weird toothbrush. Now we are told jackals down the luggage chute might steal from our paid-for checked bags and that it is our responsibility? Is this land of the free talking out of both sides of its mouth? And to think we just stand in line and wait.

I am appalled at the ridiculous charges found on hospital bills (more than $1,000 for a toothbrush, $11.75 for a box of tissues called a "mucus retrieval system," etc.). When individuals are responsible for their own bills, they are likely to examine the charges carefully and question those that seem to be out of line. But what about those on Medicare whose responsibility is usually a fraction of the actual charge? It would make sense to hire overseers and pay them a percentage of all outlandish charges that they find.

Before you dismiss the idea behind this product, think about all the dust, hair, plus who-knows-what-else floating around in the air and, more specifically, in your bathroom. Then think about where you store your toothbrush. It's probably sitting right out on the counter or sink, free to collect all kinds of ick. And what are you going to do with that ick? Stick it in your mouth. Blech! The Zapi Toothbrush Sanitizer, made by Violight, is designed to kill 99.9 percent of germs thanks to its germicidal UV light.

Dear Ann Landers: I thought I could never get pregnant because at age 14, I had ovarian problems and several surgeries. I married at 19 and tried to become pregnant. I took fertility drugs for a year, but nothing worked. We quarreled about it constantly, and finally, I divorced him. The following year, I met a wonderful young man and knew he was the one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. He wanted children right away and consulted a specialist. We were told he had a low sperm count due to a blockage, and the odds of our having a family were very slim.

Is it asking too much for your kids to quietly brush their tiny teeth so you won't have gigantic dental bills? Evidently, yes. The latest in "singing toothbrushes" is Tooth Tunes Junior by Hasbro. Sized for ages 3 to 6 and available at drugstores and discounters such as Wal-Mart and Target, the toothbrush plays a 1-minute tune so kids know how long to brush. (The American Dental Association recommends 2-minute brushings so, as kids get older, encourage them to work up to that.) Among the ditties are takeoffs of older songs: Waking Up is Hard To Do, based on Neil Sedaka's Breaking Up is Hard to Do. And If You're Happy and You Know It, Brush Your Teeth.

THE WEEKLY PICK Shannon's Pirates We have loved children's author and illustrator David Shannon since the word "No." (As in, No, David!, his first book, which he wrote at age 5.) Shannon's latest illustration effort is the adorable Pirates Don't Change Diapers ($16, Harcourt), written by Melinda Long. A follow-up to the best-selling How I Became a Pirate, the story is predictable but just as funny as the original, with pirates who aren't very good nannies and love to joke about soiled diapers, strained spinach and the like.